The French Kiss, According to the French (And How to Dress for It)

My math is crude, but in all estimation the French kiss—and its wild cousin, the boundless make-out session—perhaps peaked on the 1969 recording of Serge Gainsbourg and Jane Birkin’s “Je T’aime, Moi Non Plus.” Breathing heavily onto the seductive track, the British chanteuse cooed a passionate ode to her French lover, finishing out the song with a near-orgasmic falsetto. The racy tune was an immediate hit, it sparking rumors that the scintillating record captured a live heavy petting session between Gainsbourg and Birkin. And after being reportedly banned in some countries for its strong suggestive undertones, the song still inspires make-out goals to this day. Because let’s be honest: We live in an anti-PDA world these days.

Perhaps kissing with abandon has been largely associated with the predilections of teenagers or the alcohol-fueled mistakes of one’s college years, but a steamy encounter that doesn’t necessarily lead to sex is in fact the type of fun that’s missing in a tech-based world of unintelligible text messages, passive dating apps, and thirsty DMs. After all, hands moving across the small of your back or through your rumpled hair is bound to bring you closer to a hot date than, say, dashing off an aloof emoji-laced text to him or her. Which is perhaps why make-out sessions have been absent in our dating lives—as Vogue.com’s Market Editor Chelsea Zalopany mused, “Although PDA is a downer, do people not kiss anymore because you can’t kiss via phone?”

She may be on to something, referencing the infamous Soulja Boy tune “Kiss Me Thru the Phone” as proof that a highly wired culture may be forgetting the incredible appeal of unplugging and (halfway) undressing. So as with everything chic, let us take a page from the French this date night by literally getting back in touch with bae. Run around the streets in the wee hours of the night, kissing under door fronts that aren’t even yours on the tips of Roger Vivier floral-print leather platform sandals, as a Juan Carlos Obando off-the-shoulder Amalfi blouse provides enough skin for necking. Over a candlelit dinner, wrap yourself up into a Sonia Rykiel rainbow-colored dress, the deep cut amplifying not only your décolletage but the heat between you and your date. Or simply take the French “less is always more” approach and hook yourself into a black lacy Cosabella Bisou soft bra and matching G-string. Jane Birkin would certainly approve.

Photo: (Clockwise from top left) Courtesy of matchesfashion.com; Courtesy of net-a-porter.com; Courtesy of easypharmacie.com; Courtesy of farfetch.com; Courtesy of theoutnet.com; Courtesy of Neiman Marcus